The success of the Shenzhou VI mission has spawned space mania in China with one man declaring yesterday in Beijing that he would be the country's first space tourist.

On Wednesday, a company called Lunar Embassy offered parcels of "land" on the moon.

And a day later, Eric Anderson, president of US-based Space Adventures Ltd, confirmed that Jiang Fang will take off on a sub-orbital space mission in 2007, adding that he had paid US$100,000 for the trip.

"A new hero is created when a spaceflight is launched," Anderson said. "I want to create more private-space-travel heroes in China."

The firm sent the world's first three space tourists Dennis Tito in 2001, Mark Shuttleworth in 2002 and Greg Olsen this year to the International Space Station at a cost of a cool US$20 million each.

Jiang said he is keen to experience the feeling of zero-gravity in the one-and-half-hour sub-orbital mission where the craft flies at an altitude of 100 kilometres. A commercial jet flies at about 12 kilometres while Shenzhou VI flew at an altitude of between 200 and 344 kilometres.

"I want to experience weightlessness and explore the wonders of space," said Jiang, president of Hong Kong Space Travel Ltd, which is the Chinese agent for Space Adventure.

He explained that he decided to become the agent for the US company after applying for the trip.

His company offers services ranging from orbital and sub-orbital flights to space-flight training and other space-related adventures. The applicant doesn't need any special approval from the government.

The company is even offering a free seat for a sub-orbital adventure at an unspecified time but Chinese people seem content to watch the heroes of the country's latest manned mission, Fei Junlong and Nie Haisheng, on television Jiang said no one had booked a trip.

Yesterday's press conference shed a little more light on the man whom the media reported in February would be China's first space tourist.

The only information available then was that the man was surnamed Jiang; he was from Shenzhen in South China's Guangdong Province; and had applied for a space trip.

Eager journalists were, understandably, keen to find out more about the man but there was little forthcoming.

Jiang would only reveal that he was in 30s and involved in electronics manufacturing. He spoke with a strong southern accent and needed an interpreter to speak to his business partners or reply to reporters.

"My personal details are not relevant to the space flight," was his response when asked to reveal more about himself.

John Moltzan, Space Adventures' director of business development, who met Jiang in February, described him as a "very nice man and a good entrepreneur with a great passion for space travel."

Source: China Daily